Engineering Difficulties

Margaret and Ellie got given a set of train tracks for their birthdays, which matched so nicely with the train tracks that they already had.  Before they lent them out to a deserving cousin for a week, they were playing with them a lot.

Of course, this elaborate construction was not without some friction.  Ellie had clear ideas what they ought to build.

And Margaret was not as sold on it as she might have been.

So Ellie took matters into her own hands

while Margaret enumerated the benefits of her plan.

Then we realized that Margaret had been reading too many 19th-century children's books, when she announced that she wanted to be an engineer.

I was thrilled to the soles of my feet, until I realized that what she meant was that she wanted to be an engine-driver, which is a noble profession, but not what I had planned for my daughter.

I do sort of have planned that she should be an engineer, because female engineers get all the jobs.

And besides, she likes telling people how to build things.  Usually me, with blocks, and her ideas are faulty in the extreme, but it's a start.